Planned and regulated task shifting and task sharing can have a range of benefits. It can ensure a rational optimization of the available health workforce, address health system shortages of specialized health-care professionals, improve equity in access to health care and increase the acceptability... of health services for those receiving them. This guideline provides a range of options for expanding of health worker roles in the provision of safe abortion care, the management of complications of abortion (also known as post-abortion care in some settings and provided as part of emergency obstetric care) and for post-abortion contraception provision.
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This learning paper describes Malaria Consortium’s experience with Integrated Community Case Management (ICCM) in malaria prevention and treatment in Mozambique and Uganda. ICCM is an approach where community-based health workers are trained to identify, treat, and refer complex cases malaria (an...d other diseases) in children
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Q4: Can convulsive epilepsy be diagnosed at first level care by a non-specialist health care provider in low and middle income country settings?
This preliminary report summarizes the impact of the Ebola epidemic on the health workforce of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. It investigates the determinants of infection and describes safe practices put in place to protect health workers during the epidemic. The report covers the period from 1 ...January 2014 to 31 March 2015 and is presents findings from the 815 confirmed and probable cases for whom individual case reports were available.
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Reproduced by CHAL (Chrisitan Health Association Liberia) 3 October 2014
The skin of a patient is the first and most visible structure of the body that any health-care worker encounters during the course of an examination. To the patient, it is also highly visible, and any disease that affects it is noticeable and will have an impact on personal and social well-being. Th...e skin is therefore an important entry point for both diagnosis and management. Many diseases of humans are associated with changes to the skin, ranging from symptoms such as itching to changes in colour, feel and appearance.
This training guide explains how to identify the signs and symptoms of neglected tropical diseases of the skin through their visible characteristics. It also contains information on how to diagnose and manage common skin problems that front-line health workers may encounter.
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A Reference Guide for Program Managers and Policy Makers. Recently, a renewed interest in large-scale community health worker (CHW) programs has been seen globally. This renewal provides an opportune moment to take stock of issues and challenges such programs face and what can be done to make them a...s effective as possible. With this in mind, this manual is intended to be used a practical guide for policymakers and program managers wishing to develop or strengthen a CHW program, drawing lessons from other countries that have implemented CHW programs at-scale
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The scope of this PPC document is to serve as a guide to address the unmet public health need for a PPE system that protects the HW-F in tropical climate
s while caring for patients and providing heavy duty essential health services.
The characteristics described in this guidance are targeted fo...r PPE used in
health clinics, hospitals and communities in low resource settings where there is lack of advanced environmental controls and equipment. The purpose is to ensure harmonization in PPE design and its use to avoid confusion and exacerbating the risk of infections in HW-F. The principles of this PPC document can also be considered in risk reduction strategies
in other healthcare settings.
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As part of the Mental Health Gap Action Programme, WHO has developed training manuals (Training of trainers and supervisors training manual and Training of health-care providers training manual) to support implementation of the mhGAP Intervention Guide for mental, neurological and substance use (MNS...) disorders in non-specialized health settings, version 2.0. These manuals can be used to build capacity among non-specialist health-care providers in the assessment and management of people with priority MNS conditions in low resource settings.
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This handbook was designed primarily as a tool for district clinical specialist teams (DCSTs), and for the provincial specialists who will guide and support their work. This handbook will also be useful to managers of health facilities, heads of clinical units and nurses, doctors and allied health w...orkers at the coalface of clinical care. This handbook will be of interest to district managers and other members of the district management team who are dedicated to developing the capacity of the district health system to respond
effectively to the health needs of the population they serve. It will help them understand the role of the DCSTs and the type of
activities they need to engage in to improve the quality of care
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Research Article
PLOS Medicine | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1002374 August 8, 2017
Recently, a renewed interest in large-scale community health worker (CHW) programs has been seen globally. This renewal provides an opportune moment to take stock of issues and challenges such programs face and what can be done to make them as effective as possible. With this in mind, this manual is... intended to be used a practical guide for policymakers and program
managers wishing to develop or strengthen a CHW program, drawing lessons from other countries that have implemented CHW programs at-scale. Throughout, we discuss major policy and programmatic issues that decision-makers and planners need to consider when designing, implementing, scaling up or strengthening a national-level CHW program. We offer an overview
of specific challenges CHW programs face, country lessons, tools, and other resources that may be helpful, while incorporating relevant programmatic examples as much as possible.
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Front. Med., 27 November 2020 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2020.594728. The Checklist included eight actions for implementing rural pathways in LMICs: establishing community needs; policies and partners; exploring existing workers and scope; selecting health workers; education and training; workin...g conditions for recruitment and retention; accreditation and recognition of workers; professional support/up-skilling and; monitoring and evaluation. For each action, a summary of LMICs-specific evidence and prompts was developed to stimulate reflection and learning. To support implementation, rural pathways exemplars from different WHO regions were also compiled. Field-testing showed the Checklist is fit for purpose to guide holistic planning and benchmarking of rural pathways, irrespective of LMICs, stakeholder, or health worker type.
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Community health worker teams are potential game-changers in ensuring access to care in vulnerable communities. Who are they? What do they actually do? Can they help South Africa realize universal health coverage? As the proactive arm of the health services, community health workers teams provide ho...usehold and community education, early screening, tracing and referrals for a range of health and social services. There is little local or global evidence on the household services provided by such teams, beyond specific disease-oriented activities such as for HIV and TB. This paper seeks to address this gap.
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Self-care interventions are among the most promising and exciting new approaches to improve health and well-being, both from a health systems perspective and for people who use these interventions.
The World Health Organization (WHO) uses the following working definition of self-care: Self-care i...s the ability of individuals, families and communities to promote health, prevent disease, maintain health, and cope with illness and disability with or without the support of a health worker. The scope of self-care as described in this definition includes health promotion; disease prevention and control; self-medication; providing care to dependent persons; seeking hospital/specialist/primary care if necessary; and rehabilitation, including palliative care. It includes a range of self-care modes and approaches. While this is a broad definition that includes many activities, it is important for health policy to recognize the importance of self-care, especially where it intersects with health systems and health professionals.
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What are the FP and CAC competencies?
Through the clear articulation of the family planning and comprehensive abortion care (FP and CAC) competencies for the primary health care workforce, the aim is to advance improvements in FP and CAC service delivery by aligning health worker education approach...es with population health needs and health system demands.
This document, which describes these competencies in detail, is intended to:
be a foundational tool to be adopted and adapted by educators and regulators for FP and CAC providers (students) with a pre-service training pathway of at least 12 months;
describe competencies that are relevant to current and future health practice;
enable widespread use of the competencies not only for curriculum development for pre-service education, but also for in-service education, regulation, qualifications, quality assurance, personal development, performance evaluation, recruitment, management and career progression;
focus on the core functions of FP and CAC providers within broader efforts towards achieving universal health coverage
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